━━━━━°⌜ 痛む ⌟°━━━━━

"Or was it just a long war?"

- SPECIAL (이하이)

━━━━━°⌜ 痛む ⌟°━━━━━

The sun rose as a canopy of gold, lucid amid the prussian, bidding the stars to take their nightly rest. As darkness had started to surrender, every color changed from tinges of charcoal to a dimmer shade of blue.

Inside the tent, Taehong had finally jolted to an upright position. "Fores?" he asked softly and he remembered about the bag they were yet to retrieve. "Fores? You awake?" he asked again.

There had been no reply from her. It impelled him to check on her. And so, he did. His fingers swept forth, trying to shake her awake. Her body rocked back and forth, and when he realized that his strategy had been in vain, he changed his tactics. Light touches across her skin, and she still wouldn't open her eyes.

Tensity coursed through his veins, dreading the worst. What would he even do without the anchor that kept him sane? He didn't know. And with that, the color around him morphed. The ochre of the soul had faded more. More than the night before. Almost into a pastel gold color.

Within seconds of trying to jerk Fores awake, a wave of relief washed over Taehong. "It's a luxury to even sleep, idiot. You yourself said to be on the lookout."

"I'm sorry. Sorry," Fores whispered, wiping the corners of her mouth.

He crouched first, before pulling himself to his full height. "I'll get the bag. You stay here."

The filthy mask was on his face again, his scrunched nose making it pretty clear that he'd wanted to get this job done as fast as possible. Sneaking out of the tent was easier said than done.

Even with the sun just peeking out from the horizon, the tents had started to zip open and Taehong had barely much time left before he took off.

He had... Rebuilt himself. The night before he hadn't been the same assertive person. He'd been meek, intimidated, wanting to prove to others that he was capable too.

The neuro-chemical con job of chaos in his mind that he'd housed for such an eternity had finally seen its end. The anguish in him had made him feel stronger, and ready to face on anything. Face anything, except me. He didn't want to die, and I was pretty sure of it.

The bag was tightly wound around him when he scurried back to the tent. His steps were short, the span of distance he took per foot had significantly reduced. He still hadn't been liberated from that thing humans suffered the most - fear.

He made his way as though he were dithering. His azure orbs were steely while he looked around himself, making sure that no one had been there to watch him.

"I got it," he whispered triumphantly, holding up the bag after closing the tent securely.

Fores had been all set, the mask on her face and the armour bound up tighter, and made her look a little bulkier than before. "Thank God, you made it safe."

"How do you look like that?" he asked motioning to the newly found girth that hugged her at all the places her armor had been baggy before.

"The blankets here are good for something. I stuffed them up inside," she remarked, a shallow shrug forming on her shoulders.

"What if they notice that the blankets are missing?" There was a hint of uncertainty in his tone.

"They haven't yet noticed two of their men go missing. I'm pretty sure blankets are trivial compared to that."

A loud whistle blowed. The din ripped through the air, and simultaneous disengagement of zips could be heard. Following pursuit, Taehong and Fores stepped out. A pall of obsidian covering them from head to toe.

"Sergeants! An important news has just reached us. The safety of the House of Eclax has been compensated." The Chief announced, his voice growing from swirls that originated in his belly. "It's our duty to go there as soon as possible."

Everyone around them had begun to whisper. It was essentially, unheard of. Unheralded, even.

The House of Eclax was one of the most guarded areas that existed in the country. The tall beige stanchions that supported the building were magnolious architectural wonders. Combined with the most latest of safety equipment, it was very rare anything of such sort would even be heard.

"That's stupid," Taehong scoffed into her ear. "It's impossible. The building is too well protected for that."

"Have you seen the building?" Fores asked, her voice distorted by the confusion that ran like ink blemishing water.

With her words falling off, Taehong stiffened a bit, not very prominent yet my eyes were serrated.

I saw him chugging down the gulp of saliva pooled at the base of his throat and I quickly take off my shoes to rampage through his thoughts.

His past had always remained like those anonymous authors that remained in the minds of those who yearned to read. Those who found home in that writer's perfume puffed across the sheets. It pained him to even think about such matters, so it only made sense he'd be diffident to state it out loud, blatantly.

It took me a few seconds to reach his breaches and mind you they were darker than Nyx, if possible. All I saw is agony due to torment, whippings, blood, cries and gore tales.

Like the sheets of a book turning to Ash, his mind had withered away. No. They were like the petals of a flower. Prone to wither out into nothing.

In his mind, I saw a man being beheaded for he passed through the area that had been prohibited. He cried oodles for mercy, a lot yet none paid a smidgen of heed. I watched the charred agonizing pursuit of gore smudge against its traumatized skin. The cuts, gashes and abrasions coated with a thicker layer of dried blood.

Another thing was the apodictic crime against a woman. A pregnant one. She had cried out loud when her water broke, leading to a set of whips hugging her back. Noise was an unwelcome guest, and even the gates of your cliché hell would prove to be a better home for people than the House of Eclax.

As she bit down on her lip to avoid any more sound escaping the barricade of her lips, she lost her footing. Her nose squashed on contact with the ground and the next thing I'd known was a white, pristine orb sinking into my grips. Her baby had shuffled off its mortal coil.

The cataclysm of brutality had found it's meaning the city of Meos. Abhorrent. Scarred.

"Near it was where my mom died," he muttered. His breath was shallow, and his eyes became glossy.

"Sor-"

"You two there! Share what you want with the rest of the group too." The Chief's voice cut through the tension like a knife. "What's so serious three?"

Fear came of the emotional scar, from a time they needed safe harbour, shelter from a storm.

"It's nothing, Chief," Taehong announced, his voice wavering a little as he tensed himself to bellow out the syllables. "It's just an unfortunate situation."

Even with his voice sounding phlegmatic, his heart was ready to burst out of his rib cage. So was hers. The way her eyes remained open seemed unnatural. And they couldn't have been more grateful to the armor that sheathed their identity from prying eyes.

"Hmm, alright. Gather all the stuff from the tents. We have to get going."

With trembling hands, Fores made her way soberly and gathered the blankets and the stiff pillows that they had used the night before.

I watched the haze of my soma, the black swirls, trying to descend to the land to heat it up. The heat of being on tenterhooks was new to me, but I embraced it, regardless. Withdrawing myself from the situation, I realized that I'd been far too concerned for them. Far more than I should've been.

Distancing myself would've worked, had I been made of flesh and blood. But since that wasn't the case, taking some time to myself, away from them, was the only solution I had. So, I left. Even if I'm not quite thrilled about admitting that.

With my vision cast down, I left. Left the place where I liked being. My black swirls were akin to a swirling black cloud, as I started my locomotion. For once in my epoch, I found pulchritude in the smallest of things - the slight frondescence that had withstood the tests of time, the butterflies that remained, the dew that gathered on the virescent foliage.

The butterfly flapped its wings as it steadily landed on the leaf in the Bush. It was the sort of yellow that glowed from a homely hearth, the vermillion quietly morphing into yellow.

If ever there was magic powder, it would be that iridescent glow of the butterfly wings. It casted a spell on my sight so that I was brought into the moment with a fullness. I felt as if my thoughts were more tuned in somehow, as if I were a radio that had found a frequency that was both more halcyon and more perfervid all at once. That instant of seeing those petal-wings brought a tranquility that held me, entangled in the beauty and warmth that the mere sight generated.

The black lines on it made me feel all warm. And fuzzy. It reminded me of a hazy memory. Something that happened so long ago; I couldn't recall. It was a sensation. A nostalgic instant. Like I'd finally remembered what it used to feel like to be flesh and bones. But it would be paltry anyway.

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"Guilt is perhaps the most painful companion to death."

- Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

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